Winter School Cultural Heritage & Wellbeing, February 2025

Since 2022, the Dr. Guislain Museum has organised highly successful international five-day training events aimed at supporting professionals working in or with the cultural heritage sector in developing programs that use cultural heritage for wellbeing activities. Starting in 2025, TOON, the Flemish service organisation for the heritage of care and for the benefit wellbeing, will take over from the Dr. Guislain Museum as the lead organiser.

In 2025, TOON will team up with Dr. Guislain Museum (Ghent), University College London Arts & Sciences, and Amsab-Institute for Social History (Ghent). Together, they will deliver the International Winter School ‘Cultural Heritage & Wellbeing: Refugees’, from Monday February 3 to Friday February 7 2025 in Ghent (Belgium).

The focus of this winter school is on cultural heritage-based programs that support the mental wellbeing of forcibly displaced people. A 2022 report by the EU and WHO highlights the need for such support through art and culture: “People displaced because of natural disasters, persecution, conflict, generalised violence or human rights violations invariably experience significant loss, physical hardships, and other stressors that can lead to psychological distress. A large body of evidence shows how forcibly displaced people contribute positively to society. This potential can be further enhanced by ensuring that they are in good physical and mental health.” The report emphasizes the importance of supporting the arts, stating that investing in this field is an investment in the mental, physical, and social health of forcibly displaced people.

During the five-day program, participants will receive theoretical insights, discuss and reflect on the professional development needed to engage refugees using creative methods, and develop wellbeing programs for refugees. Participants will explore a wide range of inspiring case studies where cultural heritage has been successfully used to improve the wellbeing of refugees.

The winter school will be delivered by an experienced team of experts, who are leaders in fields connected to heritage, community engagement, and wellbeing:

• Bart De Nil (Chair) is a practitioner and PhD researcher between UCL Arts & Sciences and Information Studies, investigating public libraries as social infrastructure for creative health. For the past decade he has been leading developments in culturally mediated wellbeing in Flanders, Belgium and internationally. He will deliver several workshops aimed at improving the professional development of the participants who want to engage in developing wellbeing activities for refugees. For this he will use creative methods, such as co-produced zine making. Bart will also give the participants a final group assignment in which they can use everything they have learned during the winter school.
  
• Claire Wellesley-Smith is a researcher and artist from the United Kingdom, who specialises in long-term engagements with post-industrial textile communities across northern England. Her research explores connections between health, wellbeing and heritage through textile-based activities. During her workshop Claire will demonstrate how she worked in a project about the legacy of Louisa Pesel, an English embroiderer and educator, with community researchers to uncover the heritage of Belgian refugees in Bradford during the First World War. And how she connected with groups from the refugee and asylum seeking community and others to work on textile projects that explored their personal wellbeing.
• Thomas Kador is a lecturer in Creative Health at University College London (UCL), Department of Arts & Sciences. He is a material culture specialist with research interests in the health and wellbeing potential of (cultural) spaces, collections, and objects. He convenes UCL’s MASc Creative Health program, which focuses on non-clinical, asset-based health interventions. He will provide us with an interesting lecture on the importance of creative health and its value for the well-being of displaced people.
• Sofie Verclyte is a researcher at the School of Arts and Justice Visions of the Human Rights Centre, where she works on the project Migrating Archives. She obtained an interdisciplinary PhD in Law and Arts: Visual Arts with the research Migrating Heritage. During the winter school she will talk about her work that is situated at the crossroads of design- and legal anthropology and explores artistic and skilled practices in the context of conflict and displacement. Prior to her PhD, she studied fashion design and conflict and development studies, and worked with unaccompanied refugee minors at the Orientation and Observation Centre of Fedasil.
• Martine Vermandere is the coordinator of public relations at Amsab-ISG, Belgium. Martine will talk about her experiences with the 'Belgian Refugees 14-18' project, which aimed to chart the personal testimonies of people both in Belgium and the UK with links to WWI.
• Nadia Babazia is the head of outreach and participation at the Red Star Line Museum in Antwerp. She will deliver a workshop on homesickness. What is homesickness? Is it a feeling of nostalgia? A place that no longer exists? Or is it a feeling of longing for affection and security, for everything that matters? What scents and colours are connected to it? Together we will discover and tell stories on homesickness, and create a memorabilia to take home with us.

Organised in symbolic venues

The Dr. Guislain Museum is housed in Belgium’s oldest asylum, dating back to 1857. Surrounded by a mental health hospital, the museum seeks to challenge the many prejudices that still define what is ‘mentally ill’ and what is ‘normal’. As a museum dedicated to psychiatry, it serves as both a place of memory and a laboratory. It explores issues related to mental wellbeing and illness, revealing the complexity of the human psyche through testimonies, documents, art and photography.

For one day, the winter school will be hosted by Amsab-Institute for Social History. Amsab-ISG is a Belgian archive and research institute focused on social history. It collects and manages archives of social movements, trade unions, and political organizations, with an emphasis on the 19th and 20th centuries. Amsab-ISG makes these collections accessible to researchers and the public. In addition, it organizes exhibitions, publications, and events to raise awareness of social history. Its aim is to contribute to collective memory and provide insight into socio-economic developments.

For half a day, we will be received by De Centrale, an intercultural music centre in Ghent. It considers the super diversity in Ghent and Flanders as her inspiring reference frame and a challenging working context. De Centrale commits to the artistic expressions arising from that cultural diversity. To this end, De Centrale presents a wide spectrum of live music with roots in the city and in the world for a culturally diverse audience. It stimulates the organic traditions and transformation of living musical traditions. De Centrale is a breeding ground, an open house where artists, audience and partners establish a dialogue with each other, will connect, participate equivalently and share experiences. De Centrale opts for an operation where quality, interaction, shared citizenship and respect are of paramount importance.

Who is this training course for?

• Professionals working in cultural heritage organisations (museums, archives, galleries, libraries with special collections);
• Practitioners working with heritage in community engagement and creative health;
• Students and researchers in the fields of creative health, museum studies, etc.

What you’ll gain

By the end of this course, you will:

• Gain insights into working with forcibly displaced people;
• Be able to develop a plan for your own professional development in this area;
• Acquire knowledge on how to develop resources and design cultural heritage-based wellbeing activities for forcibly displaced people;
• Present the rationale for a resource to the group.

Practical information

• Location: Dr. Guislain Museum in Ghent, Belgium (1 day at Amsab-Institute for Social History in Ghent).
• Fee: €500 (including VAT). Reduced fee for students: €350 (including VAT). This includes lunches, refreshments and snacks during the sessions and breaks, course materials, and participation in the social program (optional). Other expenses are borne by the participants.
• Ghent offers a wide variety of accommodation.
• Participants are expected to bring their own laptops.
• Maximum of 20 participants.
• English will be the main language during the winter school.

How to register

Please send an email stating your name, position and/or institution to info@toon.vlaanderen. If your registration is accepted, you will receive an email with further details and an invoice. Your registration will only be finalized upon payment of the registration fee.

Participants will receive a briefing document with a detailed schedule of the winter school in advance.

The Winter School 2025 is organised by TOON in cooperation with the Dr. Guislain Museum, University College London Arts & Sciences, and Amsab-Institute for Social History. The program is developed and coordinated by Bart De Nil, a leader in the field of culture-led wellbeing in Flanders, Belgium, and internationally.